Prague's Svandovo Theatre to show plays with English subtitles
Prague's Svandovo Theatre aims to be a cultural centre for contemporary literature, music, theatre and visual arts. It is trying to keep the price of its tickets low to attract predominantly but by no means exclusively young people. The theatre's most recent enterprise is to draw also English speaking audiences to come and watch some of the plays they are putting on, ranging from Shakespeare to the contemporaries such as Martin McDonagh and Tracy Letts.
At the theatre café I met Svandovo Theatre's PR manager, Jitka Kadlecova, and asked her to reveal how exactly they are going to make plays in Czech understandable to foreign audiences.
"I can say it's a subtitle equipment and this is how it works. It's a projection of titles on a special screen which is hung under the stage portal, so it doesn't disturb the theatre scene. This way of translation is used in theatres all around the world, for example the same system of titling was used in the last performance of Brook's Hamlet presented in Paris."
Why did you decide to introduce English subtitles - do you think there are enough English-speakers in Prague that would like to go to the theatre and cannot because they don't understand Czech?
"I think that the community of English-speaking people living in Prague is large but the cultural scene in Prague doesn't offer much to them. As we speak about drama theatre, there is almost nothing for them. So that's why we decided to offer more. At the same time we are interested in international audience because the whole world unites in many fields of social, cultural and political life so we want to present comprehensible theatre for whomever and if these subtitles can help it, let's do it and we will see..."
Are you really the first theatre in the Czech Republic to introduce English subtitles?
"I guess we are the only theatre which uses this equipment for drama. There are subtitles in the State Opera and National Theatre and maybe somewhere else but they are used only for opera performances. So I think that drama theatre is being shown in this way only in Svandovo Theatre in Smichov."
You have already mentioned that this is usual practice abroad. But where exactly did you take your inspiration from?
"We used it on our tour in Denmark before, so that was the inspiration."
Why did you choose to subtitle exactly those five plays: The Tempest by Shakespeare, Martin McDonagh's Lieutenant of Inishmore, Tartuffe by Moliere, The Marriage by Gogol and Killer Joe by Tracy Letts?
"We think that these are the plays in our repertoire which could be attractive for English-speaking people. The Lieutenant of Inishmore is a real hit all around the world and the same we can claim about he play Killer Joe which started the so-called 'coolness drama' in the Czech Republic. And the offer of contemporary titles is completed by classical world drama which is attractive, I think, anytime. That's why we chose Moliere, Gogol and Shakespeare. And if the audience are interested, I think we will subtitle the others as well."
You can find more information at: www.svandovodivadlo.cz
